New Rules Of Engagement Research Articles

Toward a Gameic World: New Rules of Engagement from Japanese Video Games

Toward a Gameic World: New Rules of Engagement from Japanese Video Games

A team of teams creates success from successes

During the course of a winter break, I had the opportunity to read U.S. Army General (Ret.) Stanley McChrystal's marvelous text, Team of Teams: New Rules of Engagement for a Complex World. In this highly insightful and broadly applicable book for seemingly any industry or genre, General McChrystal outlines the enormous additional value that arises when groups within an organization serve one another while pursuing the overarching mission for the company as a whole.

A team of teams creates success from successes

Over the course of a winter break, I had the opportunity to read United States Army General (Ret.) Stanley McChrystal's marvelous text, Team of Teams: New Rules of Engagement for a Complex World. In this highly insightful and broadly applicable book for seemingly any industry or genre, General McChrystal outlines the enormous additional value that arises when groups within an organization serve one another while pursuing the overarching mission for the company as a whole.

Recasting U.S.-Japan Ties in a New Era of Economic Security

executive summary: This essay examines the evolution of U.S.-Japan economic relations from competition for global markets to cooperation in staving off the threats confronting the rules-based economic order by focusing on the challenges both countries face from China's weaponization of economic dominance. main argument Once the biggest thorn to bilateral relations, trade is no longer the obstacle between Japan and the U.S. that it once was. Instead, shared economic interests not only are bringing Tokyo and Washington together more closely but the two countries are leading the way to coordinate efforts to protect the rules-based liberal economic order and stave off economic coercion from China. But Japan and the U.S. need the support of other countries in Asia, Europe, and beyond to develop an economic security framework that protects the critical technologies of this new economic era and prevents abuse of economic influence. Tokyo's ability to reach across the Indo-Pacific and establish trust in building an economic architecture with new rules of engagement is leading to more equalized relations between Japan and the U.S. and a larger voice for Japan in regional affairs. policy implications • A baseline understanding between Japan and the U.S. regarding what constitutes economic security and what the threats are to protecting growth has been made clear. A slew of bilateral and multilateral initiatives has ensued as a result, but there is significant overlap among them. If the partnerships are to be effective, efforts should be consolidated and streamlined. • Japan's more realist approach to dealing with the China challenge, whereby values-based diplomacy does not supersede efforts to focus on common interests and shared challenges, resonates in the Indo-Pacific. If the U.S. continues to look to Japan's political and economic leadership, the prospects for engaging more successfully with Southeast Asian states will improve. • Protecting technologies and cooperation in technology innovation is vital for defense purposes as well as for economic expansion. At the same time, the global economy continues to face significant challenges from the disruptions caused by the Covid-19 pandemic and rising geopolitical risks. A focus on conventional economic concerns, including growth prospects and market access, cannot be sidelined if there is to be effective cooperation between industrialized nations and the global South.

Embracing Liminality and "Staying with the Trouble" on (and off) Screen

Embracing Liminality and "Staying with the Trouble" on (and off) Screen

COGNITIVE RISKS

ABSTRACT Decision science have begun to enter the lexicon of risk professionals as the concepts from Prospect Theory become popular in media outlets who increasingly warn about the risk of human biases. Decision-making under uncertainty, popularized by Dan Kahneman, Amos Tversky, Paul Slovic, Herbert Simon and other economists, is more than an examination of human biases. Prospect Theory is a reexamination of the theory of choice and the causes of violations of utility theory that has blossomed into a broad and diverse body of research in behavioral and cognitive science. This paper is an outline for a proposed draft of a cognitive risk framework that will be developed to incorporate behavioral and cognitive science into an enterprise risk framework for cybersecurity and enterprise risk governance. Herbert Simon coined the term “Bounded Rationality” in his seminal book of the same name. “Broadly stated, the task is to replace the global rationality of economic man with the kind of rational behavior that is compatible with the access to information and the computational capacities that are actually possessed by organisms, including man, in the kinds of environments in which such organisms exist” (Simon 1955a: 99). Before the development of modern of PCs and even more powerful machine learning algorithms, Simon foresaw the opportunity at the intersection of human decision-making and technology. Since Simon, other economists and researchers have broaden insights from a multidisciplinary offering of academic studies into applied behavioral science. Notwithstanding these advances, only a few scientists have developed decision science solutions at scale at the enterprise level. Machine learning and other forms of artificial intelligence will require new rules of engagement and governance controls to ensure that bias and ethical use standards have been put in place. Data, the newest commodity in all digital strategies, must be better organized and structured in organizations to allow for efficacious information workflows needed to power organizations to higher performance. And lastly, the role of humans working with and alongside machines as decision-support tools are in the early stage of deployment. The research for the book, Cognitive Risks, will examine the last frontier in risk management – the role of human actors in a business environment that is transitioning to digital products and services. A new level of awareness is needed in a digital environment that differs from the physical world. We know this because of the advent of misinformation that now permeates the Internet. Nation states and Dark Web criminals have weaponized trust in the Internet through misinformation campaigns in social media sites by using behavioral science, or more specifically, cognitive hacks to change our behavior when surfing the web. These attacks are low cost and very effective because most observers are not aware of cognitive risks. There are many variations of “cognitive hacks” and “cognitive risks” which will be explained in detail in the book. Dimitry Kiselev, director general of Russia’s state-controlled Rossiyua Segodnya media conglomerate, “Objectivity is a myth which is proposed and imposed on us.” Today, thanks to the Internet and social media, the manipulation of our perception of the world is taking place on previously unimaginable scales of time, space and intentionality. Cognitive hacks and cognitive risks are part of a new lexicon of risks we must learn. Cognitive risks are commonly referred to as heuristic behavior. Heuristics is any approach to problem solving or self-discovery that employs a practical method that is not guaranteed to be optimal, perfect, or rational, but is nevertheless sufficient for reaching an immediate, short-term goal or approximation. Where finding an optimal solution is impossible or impractical, heuristic methods can be used to speed up the process of finding a satisfactory solution. Heuristics can be mental shortcuts that ease the cognitive load of making a decision. Large swaths of the economy have already misjudged the potential, and the threats, of digital transformation. The questions explored in this paper and the subsequent book, Cognitive Risks, that will follow is why? Why do some leaders see opportunity when others only see problems? Why has the retail industry been blindsided by firms like Amazon, Google, Apple, and so many others? The research for the book will also include an exhaustive review of how applied behavioral science can be used to enhance organizational performance, risk management and cybersecurity in all organizations. Few, if any studies to date, have combined a multidisciplinary approach to enterprise risk management and organizational performance. This will be the first study that builds on a 2020 study of advancements in enterprise risk and board governance to provide a comprehensive analysis of methods and processes to apply behavioral science to address a range of risks facing organizations as they transition to a digital economy.

New Rules of Engagement: How Adaptation To Online Media Changes Older Adults' Social Connectedness

Abstract Older adults often struggle to adjust to the rapid changes in the digitizing media landscape. In this article, we study, first, how 10 older adults adapt new online media into their daily lives and, by doing so, adjust to the changing “rules of engagement” that guide online-media use in their social surroundings. Second, we analyze how this adaptation process generates change in older adults' social connectedness. Results suggest that older adults' non-use of popular online media results in social exclusion. Enhancing their social connectedness, requires older adults to (partially) conform to new communication norms and values. Based on our findings, we propose three adaptation strategies that enhance both offline and online social connectedness.

Default Probability Assessment for Project Finance Bank Loans and Basel Regulations: Searching for a New Paradigm

Syndicated loan data from India suggest that despite the pressure on margins and volumes, available “bankable” deals in infrastructure are still strongly contested by commercial lenders. With the implementation of Ind AS accounting norms (IFRS) for commercial banks, the expected credit loss–based provisions have to be set by the bank based on internally estimated probability of default (PD) for different loan portfolios. This change may lead to heavier risk-weighted capital requirements for banks, thus impacting the project finance business. Basel III norms and subsequent discussion papers propose a revised standardized approach doing away with internal modeling approaches and introduction of standardized output floors for specialized lending, including project finance. In this light, the authors present a cash flow simulation model to address the issue of PD estimation by simulating key risk factors. This method may be useful as each project and each sector is unique and so are the risks associated with it. Thus, the authors argue that the use of a simulation model will result in better assessment and monitoring of credit risk than conventional assessment methods, leading to lower default rates and therefore lower capital charge. The authors then suggest some new rules of engagement for project finance lenders to stay relevant in the changing regulatory scenario. TOPICS:Simulations, project finance, credit risk management Key Findings • Probability of default estimation and subsequent impact on credit risk capital is important for project finance lenders in India especially after emerging Basel III reforms and subsequent discussion papers on credit risk capital. (Informally called as Basel IV) • The authors suggest a cash flow simulation model developed using risk parameters “specific” to each project. The application of the model is shown on a road project and it calculates cumulative default risk probability of the project. • The article argues that this model will result in better assessment and monitoring of credit risk. Authors also suggest new rules for engagement for the project finance lenders in the emerging regulatory scenario.

Beyond the limits to governance: New rules of engagement for the tentative governance of the life sciences

‘Governance’ is a highly plastic concept that has spilled over from the political sciences and has been adopted, in some cases rather uncritically, by scholars from other social science traditions. We argue that there are limits to this all-pervasive notion of governance. Some of these limitations could potentially be addressed by the ‘tentative governance’ approach if it can create new opportunities for learning in order to cope with the problems of uncertainty at an early stage of new and emerging technologies in areas such as the life sciences. In order to move beyond these limits, we may be able to use the heuristic device offered by tentative governance as a step towards developing and adopting new rules of engagement. These new rules of engagement need (i) to recognise that consensus may not always be possible in areas of new and emerging technology and (ii) to accept a more balanced approach to governance that acknowledges the role of policy and politics. In order to achieve this, we need to go beyond science and technology studies (STS) and innovation studies and adopt a more interdisciplinary approach that acknowledges the contributions already made to this governance debate by a wide range of scholars, including those in the political sciences.

Saving Governance-By-Design

Author(s): Mulligan, DK; Bamberger, KA | Abstract: Governing through technology has proven irresistibly seductive. Everything from the Internet backbone to consumer devices employs technological to regulate behavior purposefully by promoting values such as privacy, security, intellectual property protection, innovation, and freedom of expression. Legal and policy scholarship has discussed individual skirmishes over the political impact of technical choices-from whether intelligence and police agencies can gain access to privately encrypted data to debates over digital rights management. But it has failed to come to terms with the reality that governance-by-design-the purposeful effort to use technology to embed values-is becoming a central mode of policymaking, and that our existing regulatory system fundamentally ill-equipped to prevent that phenomenon from subverting public governance. Far from being a panacea, governance-by-design has undermined important governance norms and chipped away at our voting, speech, privacy, and equality rights. In administrative agencies, courts, Congress, and international policy bodies, public discussions about embedding values in arise in a one-off, haphazard way, if at all. Constrained by their structural limitations, these traditional venues rarely explore the full range of other values that might affect, and often advance, a single value or occasionally pit one value against another. They seldom permit a meta-discussion about when and whether it appropriate to enlist technology in the service of values at all. And their policy discussions almost never include designers, engineers, and those that study the impact of socio-technical systems on values. When technology designed to regulate without such discussions-as it often is-the effects can be even more insidious. The resulting technology often hides government and corporate aims and the fundamental political decisions that have been made. In this way, governance-by-design obscures policy choices altogether. Such choices recede from the political as they become what is rather than what politics has determined ought to be. This Article proposes a detailed framework for saving governance-by-design. Through four case studies, the Article examines a range of recent battles over the values embedded in technology and makes the case that we are entering an era of policymaking by design war. These four battles, in turn, highlight four recurring dysfunctions of governance-by-design: First, governance-by-design overreaches by using overbroad technological fixes that lack the flexibility to balance equities and adapt to changing circumstances. Errors and unintended consequences result. Second, governance-by-design often privileges one or a few values while excluding other important ones, particularly broad human rights. Third, regulators lack the proper tools for governance-by-design. Administrative agencies, legislatures, and courts often lack technical expertise and have traditional structures and accountability mechanisms that poorly fit the job of regulating technology. Fourth, governance-by-design decisions that broadly affect the public are often made in private venues or in processes that make technological choices appear inevitable and apolitical. If we fail to develop new rules of engagement for governance-by-design, substantial and consequential policy choices will be made without effective public participation, purposeful debate, and relevant expertise. Important values will be sacrificed-sometimes inadvertently, because of bad decisions, and sometimes willfully, because decisions will be captured by powerful stakeholders. To address these critical issues, this Article proposes four rules of engagement. It constructs a framework to help decision makers protect values and democratic processes as they consider regulating by technology. Informed by the examination of skirmishes across the battlefields, as well as relevant Science and Technology Studies (STS), legal, design, and engineering literatures, this framework embraces four overarching imperatives: 1. Design with Modesty and Restraint to Preserve Flexibility 2. Privilege Human and Public Rights 3. Ensure Regulators Possess the Right Tools: Broad Authority and Competence, and Technical Expertise 4. Maintain the Publicness of Policymaking These rules of engagement offer a way toward surfacing and resolving value disputes in technological design, while preserving rather than subverting public governance and public values.

Team of Teams: New Rules of Engagement for a Complex World

Team of Teams: New Rules of Engagement for a Complex World

Equanimity: An Essential Leadership Practice in Challenging Times

As economist Daniel Kahneman's 1 Kahneman D Thinking, Fast and Slow. Farrar, Strauss and Giroux, New York, NY2011: 59-62 Google Scholar research reveals in Thinking, Fast and Slow, humans are hard wired to choose cognitive ease over strain, to look for the familiar and find comfort in it. Instead of having the discipline to rigorously challenge assumptions leaders may instead associate familiarity with past experience, give it more power than is warranted and potentially create bias in their thinking. 1 Kahneman D Thinking, Fast and Slow. Farrar, Strauss and Giroux, New York, NY2011: 59-62 Google Scholar When this inherent human tendency to seek familiarity instead of truth surfaces in the uncertain, turbulent health care environment, susceptible leaders are tempted to go solo for the quick fix. In his book Team of Teams, General Stanley McChrystal 2 McChrystal S Collins T Silverman D Fussell C Team of Teams: New Rules of Engagement for a Complex World. Portfolio/Penguin, New York, NY2015: 202-209 Google Scholar sounds the alarm on decision-making in a rapidly changing combat environment. Over-reliance on expertise does not work when faced with the unknown, uncertainty or a crisis; in fact, trying to use expertise in a crisis will surely impede or short-circuit our ability to see what is actually happening. When it is the leader's default position to make decisions solely based on knowledge and past experience objectivity will be lacking and most likely the input of others will be ignored. 2 McChrystal S Collins T Silverman D Fussell C Team of Teams: New Rules of Engagement for a Complex World. Portfolio/Penguin, New York, NY2015: 202-209 Google Scholar In the field of battle, as in our health care systems, one cannot afford to revert to command and control leadership, rely solely on past knowledge or experience, or to allow biased thinking to over-shadow objectivity. Henry Mintzberg famously said, “Setting oneself on a pre-determined course in unknown waters is the perfect way to sail into an iceberg.” 3 Mintzberg H The strategy concept II: another look at why organizations need strategies. Calif Manage Rev. 1987; 30: 26 Google Scholar A leadership practice that can help nurse leaders navigate the whitewater of health care is the practice of equanimity. As economist Daniel Kahneman's 1 Kahneman D Thinking, Fast and Slow. Farrar, Strauss and Giroux, New York, NY2011: 59-62 Google Scholar research reveals in Thinking, Fast and Slow, humans are hard wired to choose cognitive ease over strain, to look for the familiar and find comfort in it. Instead of having the discipline to rigorously challenge assumptions leaders may instead associate familiarity with past experience, give it more power than is warranted and potentially create bias in their thinking. 1 Kahneman D Thinking, Fast and Slow. Farrar, Strauss and Giroux, New York, NY2011: 59-62 Google Scholar When this inherent human tendency to seek familiarity instead of truth surfaces in the uncertain, turbulent health care environment, susceptible leaders are tempted to go solo for the quick fix. In his book Team of Teams, General Stanley McChrystal 2 McChrystal S Collins T Silverman D Fussell C Team of Teams: New Rules of Engagement for a Complex World. Portfolio/Penguin, New York, NY2015: 202-209 Google Scholar sounds the alarm on decision-making in a rapidly changing combat environment. Over-reliance on expertise does not work when faced with the unknown, uncertainty or a crisis; in fact, trying to use expertise in a crisis will surely impede or short-circuit our ability to see what is actually happening. When it is the leader's default position to make decisions solely based on knowledge and past experience objectivity will be lacking and most likely the input of others will be ignored. 2 McChrystal S Collins T Silverman D Fussell C Team of Teams: New Rules of Engagement for a Complex World. Portfolio/Penguin, New York, NY2015: 202-209 Google Scholar In the field of battle, as in our health care systems, one cannot afford to revert to command and control leadership, rely solely on past knowledge or experience, or to allow biased thinking to over-shadow objectivity. Henry Mintzberg famously said, “Setting oneself on a pre-determined course in unknown waters is the perfect way to sail into an iceberg.” 3 Mintzberg H The strategy concept II: another look at why organizations need strategies. Calif Manage Rev. 1987; 30: 26 Google Scholar A leadership practice that can help nurse leaders navigate the whitewater of health care is the practice of equanimity.

Defining "faculty" in academic medicine: responding to the challenges of a changing environment.

Academic medicine in the United States is at a crossroads. There are many drivers behind this, including health care reform, decreased federal research funding, a refined understanding of adult learning, and the emergence of disruptive innovations in medicine, science, and education. As faculty members are at the core of all academic activities, the definition of "faculty" in academic medicine must align with the expectations of institutions engaged in patient care, research, and education. Faculty members' activities have changed and continue to evolve. Academic health centers must therefore define new rules of engagement that reflect the interplay of institutional priorities with the need to attract, retain, and reward faculty members. In this Commentary, the authors describe and explore the potential effects of the changing landscape for institutions and their clinical faculty members. The authors make a case for institutions to adapt faculty appointment, evaluation, and promotion processes, and they propose a framework for a standardized definition of "faculty" that allows for individual variability. This framework also provides a means to evaluate and reward faculty members' contributions in education, research, and clinical care. The authors propose a deliberate national conversation to ensure that careers in academic medicine remain attractive and sustainable and that the future of academic medicine is secure.

Embarking on Accountable Care

With the advent of the Affordable Care Act, new models of care are underway. Health care experts agree that to improve care, there will need to be improved partnerships across the care continuum, finally eliminating silos of care and services. WellStar Health System, a large health care system in the southeastern part of the United States, is demonstrating its early adoption of integration and the new rules of engagement. These rules will fundamentally change the course of how to provide health care and lead the way for a more accountable-based model of care delivery. This article describes the anticipated and successful preliminary outcomes achieved in the first year of this system's demonstration project in the Medicare Shared Savings Program or "Medicare ACO." WellStar Health System began with a focus on addressing the needs of the heart failure patient. In an effort to achieve the triple aim of improving access, reducing cost, and improving outcomes, the system designed a dedicated inpatient heart failure unit. This unit operates with a new and sustainable structure that actually links the interdisciplinary and multiple providers of care across the care continuum. In doing so, a significant improvement in achieving patient's compliance with care treatment and a reduction in hospital readmissions have been achieved.

Can human resources for health in the context of noncommunicable disease control be a lever for health system changes?

Major global shifts are shaping health priorities in the wake of new challenges and emerging opportunities. While reaffirming a commitment to accelerate progress on the Millennium Development Goals, discussions on the post-2015 agenda have also focused on the importance of noncommunicable diseases (NCDs).1 Efforts are also under way to enhance countries’ commitment to universal health coverage (UHC) and to overcome the system constraints that are hampering progress towards achieving disease-specific targets. Despite auspicious directions, the journey is fraught with obstacles. A focus on human resources for health (HRH) in the context of NCD control could be a lever for health system change after 2015 by leading to measures designed to improve health systems more broadly. This view is supported by several trends. First, the required shift from the care of acute infectious diseases to chronic conditions entails a reorientation of health systems for which human resources can be an important lever. This effect has been shown in programmes for the control of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infection that have relied heavily on changes in the terms and conditions of employment: task sharing and task shifting strategies were designed; information systems, supply chains and service delivery norms were tailored towards chronic disease care; new referral systems and appointment and defaulter tracking methods were introduced; and worker training was focused on the use of new instruments, such as appointment books, patient counselling guidelines, medical records and standardized treatment protocols.2 Besides these measures, HIV programmes have also employed non-traditional human resource strategies in the form of engagement with nongovernmental organizations, service recipients, peer educators, treatment partners and expert clients.3 In the context of NCD management, human resources can be strategically leveraged in similar fashion to reorient systems towards chronic care more broadly. Second, the “health in all policies” approach is gaining appeal with the growing recognition that many paths towards improving health lie outside the health-care system.4 New stewardship capacities are required to ensure appropriate institutional mechanisms and partisan agreements, a collaborative division of labour, a commitment to shared goals and accountability for results. Change is possible only if the right human resource competencies are present at the starting point. The prevention and control of NCDs provide a platform for intersectoral engagement, both through “health in all policies” and through a more issue-centric approach, such as tobacco control.5 Third, NCDs are the focus of most of the information and communication technology-based solutions designed to overcome human resource shortages and geographic access constraints to health care. Among them are health education to promote patient screening for NCDs and cell-phone-enabled medication adherence tools for the management of asthma and diabetes, some of which have shown clinical benefits in trials.6,7 Now that 95% of the world’s population has access to mobile signals, these approaches could help to overcome critical health worker shortages, to the benefit of the one billion people in the world who would otherwise never have access to a health professional. Sim card applications, which can be powered by any type of phone, can provide health service access to patients and communities in settings where health worker shortages are not amenable to quick fixes. These emerging tools for NCD control create opportunities for revising health worker roles and maximizing the effectiveness of health systems. HRH are also an important lever in post-2015 efforts to attain UHC. Of all the resources that factor into the health system – financial, physical, technological and human – human resources are the most strategic. Individually or collectively, they can generate change within the system.8 For example, decentralization of authority from a higher government level to the subnational level can enhance accountability. Outsourcing of health service management and new service delivery arrangements can lead to improved performance. Definition of new rules of engagement between public and private entities in the health system and new recruitment and retention mechanisms, together with empowerment of facilities by granting them increased autonomy, can affect staff incentives and, consequently, morale and performance. As health systems are reoriented towards the control of NCDs, these measures become potential pathways towards health system reform. In summary, human resources for health are vital for mainstreaming changes in health systems and in the broader social system that affects the health of the population. Emerging agendas in the post-2015 landscape offer an opportunity to tap to the fullest the potential of human resources for health.

Physical Education as porn!

Background: This paper offers critical commentary on the culture of ‘performativity’ that has dominated educational discourse over the last 20 years, affecting the way in which researchers, teachers, pupils and parents think and act toward Physical Education and sport (PESP) in schools. It is a culture that, in the UK, is likely to intensify in the years ahead given Liberal-Conservative (Lib-Con) Government commitments to privatisation of public services, privileging the consumer, fostering greater diversity of provision, and freeing formal education of State and producer regulation. Purpose: To foster debate and reflection within the profession as to what Physical Education is for, what should be its guiding principles, and who should decide these things. Design: The paper offers informed polemic grounded in analyses of policy documents and personal research on Physical Education and Health over the last 20 or so years. Analyses: The paper re-stakes a claim for the importance of sociology in educational analysis and policy development, and the rediscovery of debate around their guiding principles. It was, after all, Durkheim (1956) who regarded as ‘the prime postulate of all pedagogical speculation that education is an eminently social thing in its origins as in its functions, and that, therefore, pedagogy depends on sociology more closely than any other science’ (Durkheim 1971, 91). How ironic, then, that, since the 1980s, the capacity of sociology to influence pedagogy has been so marginal, at a time when it has had so much to say. The paper speculates as to why this dislocation has occurred and with what consequences for what we know about teaching and how children learn and think about their body's value and worth. Conclusion: If performative culture is allowed to configure and define Physical Education, then it is likely to cultivate principles of thought and action somewhat akin to those defining Porn. If sociology or education research is to guide policy and practice in education away from the ‘pornification of PE’ (sic) it has to consider: what are the new rules of engagement between pedagogy and sociology?; how and where are the voices of sociologists, pedagogues and researchers to be heard? How are closer allegiances between formal Education, Government and Media to be forged?

If organizations are from Venus and businesses are from Mars, can branding be the bridge? A seven-step guide to stellar partnerships

The central message of my article is contained in the title: ‘If organizations are from Venus and businesses are from Mars, can branding be the bridge? A seven-step guide to stellar partnerships’. Fundamentally different in character, temperament and priorities, UN/NGOs and businesses have traditionally been cautious, even suspicious of one another. The article focuses on partnerships as an emerging discipline and aims to establish new rules of engagement between business and organizations. However counter-intuitive, our thesis is based on this insight: as brands are fundamentally about relationships, branding can be the bridge to trust and accountability, shockingly the chief components reported lacking in public–private partnerships today. The seven-step guide that follows is fully grounded in well-established brand-building principles.

Technologies of hospitality: How planned encounters develop between strangers

New technologies in use today like CouchSurfing.com are allowing people to create planned encounters, en masse, between other strangers. These 'technologies of hospitality' are producing new rules of engagement, and new relationships that blur the boundaries between friend, acquaintance, stranger and enemy – boundaries that are yet to be defined. This article will show that while mobility inevitably causes strangers to collide and interact, certain technologies of hospitality in use today create conditions for strangers to meet one another and engage in acts of hospitality – moments of intimacy, closeness or mutual understanding. This article outlines the process by which two strangers become close using one such technology: CouchSurfing.org. While such encounters foster trust, mutual learning and 'personal growth', closeness is not always altruistic and technologies of hospitality also allow people involved to exert their status and power during interaction, creating moments of tension, awkwardness or distrust. Using multi-method ethnography, this article provides an in-depth account of these technologies of hospitality, focusing on the relationships being created as well as the problems that arise for the way in which we define friendship and closeness today.

From Products to Services: Understanding the New Rules of Engagement

New services are changing the product‐design game for consumers and manufacturers alike. Here is a look at four current models in which services are supplanting the traditional role of the physical product.

Localism and the new rules of engagement

Localism and the new rules of engagement